AN ARMY ENGINEER EXPLORES NICARAGUA
a toucan, two parrakeets, and numerous
small patio birds made up the collection.
We had a half dozen full-blooded In
dian maidens for our servants. In all
Nicaraguan homes of the better class the
families are large and include many gen
erations. Houses are beehives. Children
are numerous; so are the servants, the
latter frequently exceeding in number the
members of the large family served.
We found our servants faithful and af
fectionate and in many ways loyal, but of
course unfamiliar with American ways and
customs and sometimes obstinate and stub
born in their refusal to learn them. Ours
were foolish ways in their eyes; they could
see no reason why water should be boiled
before drinking or food protected from
flies; why sheets should be tucked in at the
foot of the bed, or what possible use there
could be for two forks at one meal, when
it was so simple to lay the first one aside
and have it ready for subsequent use.
Their loyalty to us had some queer
twists. Why should they tell us that their
poor compatriot, who had packed a sack of
charcoal many miles from her hut in the
country that morning, was asking at our
door three times the ordinary price of char
coal demanded of any of our Nicaraguan
neighbors? Charcoal was worth what one
could sell it for, any way.
EVERY BEDROOM HAS ITS HAMMOCK
The fundamental idea of all trade,
whether with a street vender or in the
largest store, is that anything is worth what
the seller can get for it. In the eyes of an
American, articles such as fruits and vege
tables raised locally or goods made in Nica
ragua are cheap; but, because of the high
duty and the enormous profit that the mer
chant must make, articles of American
manufacture cost about three times the
price one would pay in the United States.
There are no five- and ten-cent stores in
Nicaragua.
There is not much that is typical of the
country that one cares to buy. If you stay
long enough in Nicaragua to acquire the
hammock habit, by all means secure one of
the fine hammocks made by the Indian
women living near Masaya. They are so
large that one can sleep comfortably on
one lying crosswise. No Nicaraguan bed
room is complete without one.
Photograph by Alexis Kokoushkin
ONE CAMP HAD A SUSPENSION BRIDGE
Engineers of Company A improvised this 40
foot span across the Rio Grande. The footing
consists of roughly hewn planks called "chests"
by the builders.
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